Chechen resistance crackdown succeeds again

Rizvan Chitigov, a prominent 40-year-old field commander, has been killed in Chechnya's Shali district, reports a source at the Chechen law enforcement agencies.

"In a successful special operation, officers of the Chechen Interior Ministry and presidential security service killed Rizvan Chitigov, a rebel leader well-known in the republic. He would be a subordinate of the Arab terrorist Khattab for a while and he joined Basayev after Khattab's destruction. Chitigov was charged with a large number of grave crimes, including murders of federal servicemen and law enforcers," the police officer said. He did not give any details of the operation saying he had no reliable information.

President Alu Alkhanov of Chechnya calls the information about Rizvan Chitigov's destruction reliable, Novosti news agency says. "I was informed about this earlier today and I think the information it reliable," Alkhanov said at a press conference in Moscow.

Speaking about Chitigov's role in terrorist activities, the Chechen president called him "a major figure in rebel groups who had numerous murders of law enforcers and government officials on his conscience".

In 2002, special services became informed Chitigov wanted to obtain poisonous substances to commit terrorist acts against federal forces, says a spokesman for the Regional Operations Headquarters (ROH) for the Counter-terrorist Operation in the North Caucasus. "That time, his notes were found on how to produce home-made poisonous substances," the agency's interlocutor said.

Rizvan Chitigov became known as a field commander during the second military campaign in Chechnya. According to law enforcement agencies, Chitigov was involved in the abduction of OSCE mission members in Chechnya and executions of federal servicemen.

The ROH spokesmen said Chitigov was a native of the Shali district. He used several fake IDs, was known under the alias Ramzan and used the callsigns Buran ("Blizzard") and Minyor ("Combat engineer").

In the mid-1990s, he headed a special unit at the security service of the so-called Ichkeria. "Chitigov, like Shamil Basayev, was a member of the so-called Supreme Council (Shura) of Chechnya and Dagestan," added the interlocutor of Novosti.

Chitigov coordinated all sabotage and terrorist activities in the Shali district. He was a trusted person of the Arab mercenary Khattab who was killed in Chechnya in 2003.

The investigator, who earlier was in charge of the inquiry into the 2009 murder of the lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburova, has been appointed to head the group of investigators to run the inquiry into the murder of politician Boris Nemtsov.

Participants of a picket held in Astrakhan as a part of the all-Russian campaign "Vesna" (Spring), have paid tribute to Boris Nemtsov. They have also expressed their hope that his death will cause the oppositionists to stick together, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

During the week from February 23 to March 1, 2015, at least 23 people fell victim to armed conflict in Northern Caucasus. Of them, 17 people were killed and six others wounded. These are the results of the calculations run by the "Caucasian Knot" based on its own materials and information from other open sources.

Relatives of Djabu Magomedov, a resident of the Kizilyurt District, cannot get official information about his whereabouts since February 26. According to a source in the Kizilyurt GOVD (City Interior Department), Djabu Magomedov is suspected of aiding and abetting members of illegal armed formations (IAFs), and he is in Makhachkala.

Today, in Moscow, the mourning procession in memory of murdered politician Boris Nemtsov has gathered 50,000-70,000 people, organizers of the action report. One of the key attributes in the hands of participants of the action was represented by the Russian flag. In this particular case, it symbolized the people of Russia and not the President, said Svetlana Gannushkina, the head of the Committee "Civil Assistance".

On March 1, members of the opposition movements in Rostov-on-Don held a rally in the Sedov city square to pay tribute to the memory of politician Boris Nemtsov murdered a day before. Following the event, the resolution was adopted with the demand for an independent investigation into the murder and the immediate cessation of the war in Ukraine.